"Beren beautiful!" Bregon hooted.

"*Very beautiful." Luthien corrected and smiled kindly at her brother by marriage. "You are beautiful too, but not quite as beautiful as Beren." Bregon blushed.

"Their mother is not likely to disagree with you," Emeldir said tranquilly.

"Though I may." put in Adanel, laughing. "But sisters never can see such things, or so they say."

"Nor brothers either." Luthien agreed. "It's quite true. Celeborn never could see this superlative beauty of mine - or so he claimed."

"Celeborn is your brother?" Emeldir asked.

"Not exactly," Luthien explained. "A foster brother but a cousin by blood. We were children together." A thought struck. "Everybody was against his marriage too."

Beren looked up at her in surprise. "I thought you said he'd married Lord Finrod's sister Lady Nerwen?"

"Exactly, a Noldo and an Exile. Even if she is our kin on her mother's side. They called her Kinslayer and accursed and were almost as unreasonable and unpleasant to them as they were to us."

...

The Court of Menegroth had long since become accustomed to their Princess' new habit of going alone to Neldoreth, and if she went more often and stayed longer well it was spring after all. Luthien was not a fool, she knew perfectly well her parents would not approve of her befriending a Man and harboring him in her wood. She knew she had to keep him a secret - but at the same time she felt a desperate need to talk about him to somebody!

"I call him Anorion, Child of the Sun, as I am Daughter of Twilight," Luthien burbled happily. "His hair is a wonderful dark gold color, like bronze, and so is his beard - did I mention he's bearded like a Dwarf? And he has the most beautiful eyes -"

"Yes, but how did a Man get past the Girdle?" Runen, the most senior of her handmaidens, interrupted.

Luthien's perfect brow creased in a slight frown. "I wondered about that too. When I asked Anorion he just said it had been a hard journey and one he wanted to forget."

"I can imagine," Runen said grimly. For she, with Luthien, had watched the Queen weave the mazes of shadow and bewilderment that formed the Girdle of Melian.

"I think the animals must have guided him through." Luthien continued meditatively. "He has the most amazing bond with them and understands their language like a Lindar."

"I didn't know Men could do that," Duveleth, the most junior of Luthien's handmaidens, said doubtfully. "I thought they were supposed to be clumsy and rather stupid, though very brave fighters."

"Oh no!" the Princess shook her head emphatically. "I used to think that too but now, knowing Anorion, I see they are really very little different from Elves, just as my cousin Finrod always claimed."

"My sisters and I used to go to watch the Men on the other side of the Teiglin when they came down for water or to fish," Duveleth offered propitiatingly. "They did look like us, only not so tall and a little thicker in the body."

"Anorion is not quite as tall as I am but very broad in the shoulders though his waist is nice and slim," Luthien said dreamily.

The two handmaidens exchanged looks. "But what are you going to do with him, Luthien?" Runen wanted to know.

"Do with him?" their mistress echoed blankly.

"You know we're supposed to bring any outsiders we find wandering on the borders to the King," Duveleth reminded her patiently, "and how his Grace has always been firm set against having Men here."

Runen nodded. "Why he won't even let Lord Finrod bring his Edain retainers with him when he visits."

Luthien bit her lip then lifted her chin defiantly. "Neldoreth is my demesne. If I want to give Anorion refuge there it's my business and nobody else's, not even Father's." her face softened. "I think Anorion had a very terrible time Outside. He's safe and happy in Neldoreth and I won't have him cast out because Father's taken against Men without ever even meeting one!"

...

Luthien was still feeling righteously defiant as she walked through the beech-wood to meet Anorion but also more than a little guilty. For she knew perfectly well she was bending if not breaking, the Law of her People and indirectly defying her father and king. But she didn't want to share Anorion with the rest of the world, at least not yet. Surely it would do no harm to keep him to herself for just a little longer? She knew her father would never grudge her something that made her so happy. But what of Anorion himself? What if he wanted to leave? What if he didn't like living alone in the woods and wanted to go back to his own people? How could she bear it if he left her?

"Why the frown, sweetheart?"

Luthien whipped around. "How do you do that?"

His left eyebrow lifted a trifle. "Do what?" he asked innocently - as if he didn't know!"

"Sneak up on me. I am Eldar and this is my wood. Nothing and nobody should be able to conceal themselves from me here. How can you?"

"Practice," he said wryly, "years and years of it. But you didn't answer my question, Tinuviel."

She lowered her eyes, peeked nervously at him through her lashes. "I was wondering if - if you might want to leave the beech-wood. Someday that is."

His hand turned her face to his. "Never," he said softly, those pale dawn sky eyes boring into hers, flooding her body with warmth. "I will never want to leave you, my Tinuviel."

"That's good." she managed, "I think I would fade away if you did."

"It won't happen." he promised huskily just before their lips met.

That settles it then, she thought blissfully. Anorion was happy with her in Neldoreth and she would see to it he was left in peace.

...

But in the end it was Luthien herself who gave her secret away. Her fits of abstraction and sudden disinterest in her usual pleasures and pastimes did not go unnoticed by her parents or others in Menegroth. It was just a matter of time until somebody set himself to find out the reason why. It was Daeron, master singer of Doriath, whose stretched ear overheard unguarded whispers between Luthien and her favored handmaidens and immediately took his knowledge to the King.(1)

Thingol sent at once for his daughter. She came to the small audience room he had chosen for the confrontation, attended by Runen and Duveleth as requested, and blinked in surprise at the sight of her parents seated upon their thrones with Councillor Oropher and Captain Mablung beside Thingol, and Daeron lurking rather shamefacedly behind Melian's chair.

"Daughter," the King began heavily, "a serious accusation has been brought against you. It is said you have brought a fugitive Man into the realm in defiance of my laws."

Duveleth blushed bright red and Runen turned a trifle pale but Luthien frowned darkly. "Who told you!"

Thingol blinked at the unexpected assault, recovered himself; "That is immaterial. Is the charge true?"

"It is not!" she said heatedly then amended. "Or rather not exactly. I did find a Man in Neldoreth but he got in all by himself, I had nothing to do with it."

Thingol heard the truth ringing in his daughter's voice, turned to his wife. "How is that possible? What Mortal could pass through your defenses?"

"One with a greater hand than mine guiding him," Melian replied, and her eyes were troubled.

"You mean the Dark One -" Oropher began horrified, only to be instantly interrupted by a furious Luthien.

"There is no taint of the Shadow on my Anorion!

"I spoke not of the Dark Lord," Melian said flatly. "My Girdle is proof against his servants."

Thingol barely heard her. The words 'My Anorion' rang too loudly in his ears. What kind of spell had this Mortal put upon his Luthien?

"Mablung." he said, furious and afraid, "go to Neldoreth and bring this Man to me!"

His daughter smiled smugly. "Look all you like, you won't find him - I know."

...

"And they didn't," Luthien told her new family just as smugly. "Mablung and Beleg and all the Wardens they could pull in from the marches combed Neldoreth from the Esgalduin to the borders of the Dungortheb but not a hair or trace of my Anorion did they find."

"If I'd know who they were and why they sought me I'd have surrendered at once." Beren put in. "But I didn't even know I was in Doriath, much less that I'd been keeping company with the King's daughter!"

"You didn't tell me who you were either," Luthien reminded him.

"I didn't think my name would mean anything to you," he protested. "As far as I knew then nobody'd ever even heard of me! How was I to know beasts and birds escaping from Dorthonion had passed my story on to the Lindar and they'd made songs of it?"

...

1. I know this isn't the way it's told in the songs but think about it, is it really likely that Beren even distracted by Luthien would fail to detect a spy watching them? Given his background as a guerilla fighter and a kind of proto-Ranger I mean. I didn't think so either.